


She Keeps the Taxes Low or: How to Win the Throne and Keep It

by Ayabelle (lea_hazel)



Category: Collar of the Damned, Original Work
Genre: Gen, Meta, Moral Ambiguity, Nonfiction, Politics, Propaganda, Villain Protagonist, Women In Power
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-25
Updated: 2014-01-25
Packaged: 2018-01-09 13:37:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1146623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lea_hazel/pseuds/Ayabelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Meta for the GPB square 'taxes', filling in some of the missing details from canon with extrapolation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	She Keeps the Taxes Low or: How to Win the Throne and Keep It

The rough transition between the end of _Collar of the Damned_ and the beginning of _Halcyon Queen_ left a number of large continuity gaps in the history of Obelanth, and the personal histories of our favorite characters. Sudden and violent changes to their attitude and behavior went unexplained, their underlying motivations obscure. Fans cried foul, and many a word was poured trying to explain, excuse, or rewrite the changes. By far the most glaring omission, at least in my eyes, is the process by which Aya came to control the throne of Tara Vivia.

The final scenes of _Collar of the Damned_ left the Bloody Duke dead and Aya in possession of the eponymous collar. Braugan and Greer were both severely injured. Omi was left unaccounted for, but known to be alive. The only character who survived the last battle totally unscathed was Tena, due presumably to its unexplained shadow abilities. We then fast forward a bit more than a year to the opening of _Halcyon Queen_ , which shows Aya on the throne and Braugan imprisoned in Winter Sun. Sometime during that year, Aya assumed the name of Norabelle and consolidated her power as the new Duchess Vivianto.

How did Norabelle manage to secure the title of duchess? True, she was a hero of the Viviantine wars, but many others could claim the same. Was the physical act of killing the Bloody Duke enough in itself to prove her claim, as a kind of mythological test of worthiness? While this would make for an excellent in-universe propaganda document, as a political tactic it leaves something to be desired. I find it hard to imagine the guildmasters and merchant princes accepting a no-name stranger as a peacetime ruler. Even if Vivianti really did decimate the aristocracy as some fans have suggested, it strains credibility.

Canon makes brief mention of the post-war cleanup, in particular the dismissal of the manticore infantry. Spearheading the campaign to drive the manticores north of the river could have conceivably earned Aya enough goodwill to claim a permanent place among the military elite, and from there to the civil government. However, the art of war is not really her strength, and canon leaves no doubt that her authority as duchess is derived from her success as a peacetime ruler. I would argue that diplomacy and trade are her strengths, and much likelier as her route to power.

The loci of power in Brighthaven shed little light on the matter. Enlightenment comes, if at all, from Greatfording. In an easily overlooked scene during the Ariata trade fair, the guildmasters are discussing the beginning of the Viviantine war – counted from the Malian declaration, of course. Caywen Glassier, who was more invested in the war than most, speculates about what caused the Tormel triumvirate to finally issue a declaration of hostility against the Bloody Duke. Clearly it was not the mounting death toll, since that ought to have moved them to action much sooner. Unlike Greatfording, they were not themselves under threat of invasion – at the time.

If I recall correctly, it's the cloudling Master of Commerce who puts in the final word: Tormel wanted Vivianti gone because his expansionist wars were bad for trade. Neither the river routes nor the Saffron Road were safe to travel during the later years of the Viviantine conquest; the duke's aggressions towards Sedril were a threat to the salt trade; and worst of all, he threatened to shut down the ports of the coast cities.

What is all this to do with Nora, you might ask? Everything. If foreign nations banded together reluctantly to eject Duke Eryth because he was bad for trade, it follows that Duchess Norabelle was accepted because she allowed trade to flourish. The Malian peace didn't truly mark the end of the war; it only truly began when the Greatfording guildmasters decided to reopen river trade. We'd already seen earlier in canon how Aya dealt with the Glassier guildsmen. We know what her negotiation techniques look like from the many episodes during the war in which she was called upon to settle tactical disputes, not because of her strategical acumen, but because her capacity for mediation. All things considered, I have no doubt that Norabelle had a major role in reopening the roads, and that this intervension won her the good will of Obelanth's neighbors.

What about the Obelanthine people themselves, and more specifically, what about the people of Brighthaven city? The Bright Army had plenty of dealings with the meade and hills people, but Brighthaven itself was kept so tightly under lock and key that its people knew nothing of the assembled armies that challenged their duke. In order to rally behind a new duchess, they would have necessarily received promises of reward, just as the rural folk had been promised an autumn harvest, and the tradesmen, a new road.

Nora's early, hollow promises could not possibly have held up without some assurance that they will be fulfilled. After all, she could not possibly have brought in a harvest immediately upon the end of the war. She had to have some tangible reward to boost morale and keep the people's patience from flagging throughout the long, arduous process of rebuilding, which was yet incomplete as of the first chapters of _Halcyon Queen_. The lady of the grain sheaf cuts an impressive figure, but not as impressive as money in your pocket.

That right there is the crux of the matter. In order to establish a reign in which peacetime concerns like trade and agriculture would be foremost, the Duchess Vivianto had to prove that she understood the interests of the people. This has always been one of Aya's strengths. She argued about it with Jaylen throughout _Lost Idols_ , and with Noriel and Braugan in the later parts of _Ashes_. As a girl living near the Greatfording docks, Aya implicitly understood the fears of day-to-day survival in a way that the others could not. She outlines her philosophy of rulership to General Adiar, shortly after her ejection from the Sedrillian embassy.

The people love her, she said, because she keeps the taxes low and the roads in good repair. All the pomp and circumstance surrounding her coronation, from the bombastic demigoddess imagery to her adopted regnal name with its many subtle hints and innuendo, they are all designed with this in mind. After all, what better way to underscore a queen's commitment to bringing in the harvest than to depict her in the form of an agricultural divinity? Brighthaven's treasury had been exhausted by its many wars and the grain stores were similarly empty. With nothing in hand to give out, she elected to appease the people with a tangible prize – but not one that could be collected.

Whence the money to lower taxes? The treasury, as we know, was empty. The Bright Army's coffers can't have fared much better, given the cost of waging war with no apparent source of income. The Malians had deep pockets, but ones which I doubt they were willing to turn out. The inevitable conclusion I draw is that Norabelle's much celebrated tax cut, which may or may not have won her the allegiance of the Obelanthine people, was entirely fake. That is to say, if she had not publicly declared a lenience, the revenue from taxation would have remained much the same.

This betrays the basic duality of Aya's character as it manifests in her ruling philosophy. On the one hand, a hard-used dockside flower seller, wary and cynical, with no concerns beyond proximate survival. Conversely, a brutal tyrant and consummate liar, able to manipulate masses of people by appealing to the same instinct of self-preservation that she herself had become known for. When you analyze the text closely, it's easy to see how one feeds directly into the other. A woman like Aya could not help but take a seat of power that lies before her, vacant, and would not use that power in any other way.

If you follow the logic even further you find that it cycles back around to the beginning. The image of the Halcyon Aurora is so manipulated as to appeal to the sensibilities of people exhausted by a generation-long war; a promise of peace and prosperity, but it's not wholly false. By the time we catch up with Norabelle her transformation of Brighthaven is already beginning to show its results. A year or more after taking the Viviantine throne the festival of lights shows all of her kept promises. Her character arc comes full circle when you realize survival was always her ultimate goal: she finally brought the harvest in.  


End file.
